


you've been looking for more

by crownedcarl



Series: we've been holding on to us [2]
Category: Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency (TV 2016)
Genre: Dorks in Love, Gen, Getting Together, Happy Ending, Mild Sexual Content, Multi, OT3, Pining, forgive me Father for I have sinned, i apologize in advance for my misuse of these additional tags, that's it i think i'm done sorry, todd's emotionally constipated but what else is new
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-02-27
Updated: 2017-02-27
Packaged: 2018-09-27 09:02:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,415
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9994319
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/crownedcarl/pseuds/crownedcarl
Summary: “If he’s in love with me,” Todd says, “And I’m in love with him, where does that leave you?”It might be a cruel question, but Farah’s never had time for pleasantries. She exhales sharply, shaking her head.“I’ll let you know as soon as I do.”





	

**Author's Note:**

> DO NOT FRET this fic isn't half as angsty as the summary makes it sound !!!
> 
> anyway. this is the sequel to waiting for the sun to rise where you are, isn't that swell, pls go read the first part if you haven't yet and tell me i'm a terrible writer and leave kudos thanks ilu
> 
> there will most likely be a third and final part to this series lol who knows ...
> 
> i made the ot3 happen, i hope y'all are happy. go forth and enjoy, let me know what you think in the comments !!!
> 
> (series & work title are once again taken shamelessly from superstar by broods)

Absence makes the heart grow fonder - that’s what people say, and Todd wants to kick in the teeth of whoever invented that idiom, because Amanda has been missing for two _months_ and Todd is pretty sure that if she had a choice between staying locked up wherever she is and seeing him again, she’d turn back to her captors with open arms.

He does miss her. Of course he does, but that doesn’t mean he deserves her forgiveness. He knows that, too.

His life is a cosmic joke, at this point; road-tripping across the country in a shitty van in the hopes of thwarting a government conspiracy wasn’t how he thought he’d be spending his free time, and the fact that he’s doing it with a mildly deranged P.I and a _highly_ deranged Dirk-?

As little as Todd wants to admit it, maybe the two of them aren’t the worst people to be trying to save the world with. Farah is good company, at least, when she snaps out of her lengthy staring matches with the ceiling of the van long enough to indulge Todd in small-talk. That’s all he seems to be capable of, lately, but it’s hard to be chatty when half the time, he’s gritting his teeth against sudden and awful bursts of pain throughout his body.

He hasn’t told them, yet. It’s selfish, but they’re finally making progress. What good is he to them if he’s doubling over and screaming himself hoarse in the middle of their grand rescue mission?

Selfish, that’s what he is. Who he is.

Farah makes him go to bed even if he can't sleep, but _bed_ is a bit of an exaggeration, considering how they’re curled up on a lumpy mattress squeezed into the back of the van. She lies next to him, their chests pressed together, heartbeats misaligned and out of sync.

She says “I know what you're hiding from us,” and then laughs before Todd can deny it or defend himself. “For a detective, he can be pretty oblivious.”

He doesn't answer. He stares at Farah’s face in the darkness of the cramped space and says “He doesn't need to know.”

“Sure,” she agrees, then says “He's in love with you, you know.”

Todd nods warily.

“You're in love with him, too.”

“Yes,” he says, then “No. It's not that simple.”

There’s no deterring Farah, though. There’s something knowing and dark in her eyes. “It is that simple,” she insists. “It’s not the end of the world, Todd. Believe it or not, this is a _good_ thing.”

Does she sound wistful, or is that Todd’s own imagination acting up? He can’t tell. He doesn’t want to.

He clasps his hand around hers, though, in a silent offer of comfort, or support, or companionship. With Dirk snoring quietly at their feet, the moment isn’t as quiet or as private as Todd would like for it to be.

“And you?” he asks, because he doesn’t know how not to.

“What about me?”

There’s a thinly veiled wariness in Farah’s voice, all of a sudden. The pain in Todd’s chest that flares up and then fades to an ache isn’t a trick his body is pulling on him; no, the sensation of being stabbed is real and heady and weirdly relieving. “If he’s in love with me,” Todd says, “And I’m in love with him, where does that leave you?”

It might be a cruel question, but Farah’s never had time for pleasantries. She exhales sharply, shaking her head.

“I’ll let you know as soon as I do.”

-

Farah takes her coffee black. Todd adds one sugar. Dirk, being Dirk, adds three sugars and then adds another, after a moment’s contemplation.

“That’s disgusting,” Farah informs him, and Dirk shoves his mug beneath her nose with a bright smile. She stares down at his drink, more milk and sugar than actual _coffee_ , then sighs before she takes a sip. “Yup,” she concurs. “Disgusting.”

Todd is pretending he can’t hear them. Todd is biting his tongue. His toes are freezing. He slipped away to the bathroom ten minutes ago and got the sudden chill and chattering of his teeth under control, coming back shaken and still in the last throes of an episode.

His toes are freezing, but it’ll ease up any moment now.

 _“Todd,”_ Dirk sighs, resting his head on Todd’s shoulder, making a pleased little noise when Todd absently adjusts to let Dirk get comfortable. “This reminds me of my youth.”

Farah snorts inelegantly. She does a lot of things that way; without poise, without control. She’s damn competent with a firearm, less so when her guard is down. She’s inelegant and brittle, sometimes. They all are.

“Yeah, I can see that,” she concedes, raising an eyebrow. “If you spent your youth with a veritable assassin and a, what - professional trouble magnet?”

“You’re hilarious,” Todd tells her flatly. “You should do stand-up.”

Dirk hums. “Assassin is harsh,” he declares, “And inaccurate. No, _Bart_ is an assassin, except nobody pays her,” and Todd resists the urge to tell him that by definition, an assassin gets _paid,_ but Dirk goes on cheerfully. “I’d call you a gunman. Gunwoman? Much more flattering.”

Todd raises his mug in a sarcastic salute. “Now that we’ve settled the linguistics debate,” he mutters, “Can we _please_ get the map off the table and stop talking about assassins? The waitress is staring at us like we’re about to rob a bank or something.”

Farah frowns, but seems to agree. She folds up the various blueprints and stuffs them in her tote bag, careful not to wrinkle them too badly, but the waitress keeps a vigilant eye on them. Todd offers her a weak smile.

“Of all the places,” Farah says thoughtfully, “They’re keeping everyone locked inside a _dam?_ ”

“Well, it makes sense,” Dirk declares, shrugging when Todd gives him an incredulous look. “It does to me, at least! Thick concrete barriers,” he clarifies, “Messes with psychic perception and so on and so forth. If they had me locked up in there, I’d hardly be able to use my abilities to find my own back pocket!”

“Dirk,” Farah laughs, not unkindly, “You failed to find your back pocket _yesterday_. No offense.”

“Not that anyone cares,” Todd groans, resting his head on his folded arms, “But you’re the worst. Both of you.”

“We know,” Farah agrees, and he thinks he can hear an unfamiliar warmth in her tone. “But you’re stuck with us.”

-

Another night spent bunking in the back of the van. Another night of Dirk’s bony elbows poking Todd in the back, or Farah’s sharp knees stealing the breath from him when she knocks them into his gut.

Todd rips the blanket off his body and stumbles into the cool night air. They’ve parked on a dirt road in the middle of nowhere. The inside of the van is plastered with news clippings and, for some reason, a Polaroid of all of them together that Dirk had taken a few weeks ago. Farah is smiling, and Dirk’s face takes up approximately 70% of the photo, with Todd lurking behind his shoulder with a scowl.

Truth be told, that might be the happiest he’s looked in a while. Truth be told, Todd knows it’s pathetic.

He lights up a cigarette and sits down in the dirt, leaning back against the van. After a few minutes of rustling from inside the van, Farah pops outside to join him. He tries not to look, but she’s wearing shorts and a sports bra and nothing else; her arms have goosebumps on them, but she doesn’t seem to notice the cold at all.

“Pass it here,” she says, sliding down the van to sit beside Todd, their shoulders pressing together. It isn’t unpleasant. Todd hands her the cigarette, trying not to watch her mouth.

He tries not to watch her or Dirk too much, these days. He might not be successful half of the time, but he’s _trying_.

“I know why I’m up,” Todd tells her, knocking his head back against the van. He winces, but the pain is welcome. At least he’s controlling it, now. “What’s your excuse?”

Shrugging, Farah doesn’t say anything, at first. Todd doesn’t know if she minds him staring, but he’s trying to catalog her: trying to recognize if the tense set of her shoulders is natural, or if she’s carrying around heavier burdens than Todd dares to ask about.

“You know,” she says, drawing his attention, “I can’t decide if you’re a coward or the bravest person I’ve ever known.”

When Todd opens his mouth in bewilderment, Farah raises an eyebrow at him, and it shuts him up. “See,” she goes on, “There’s this guy who’s head over heels for you, and you spend half your time staring at _me_. And we’re doing something crazy,” Farah admits, “We’re trying to do the impossible, and you’re miserable, and you don’t have to be. So I guess my question is,” she sighs, letting the cigarette burn down to the filter between her fingers, “Are you brave, or are you the biggest wimp in the world?”

In an unsteady voice, Todd snaps “That’s not fair. You know it isn’t. And,” he adds, staring down at the dirt between his knees, “Why can’t I stare at you, half the time? That’s all it is,” Todd tells her, voice heavy with meaning. “Half.”

“You don’t-” Farah exclaims, then interrupts herself, frowning at him. “You don’t see me in that way. Do you?”

Maybe. Is that a good enough answer? For someone like Farah who deals in the definitive, Todd doubts it.

“Yeah,” he tells her, and it’s Farah who’s speechless, this time around. “You happy, now?”

It’s the middle of the night, but her smile is blinding. “Sure,” she agrees, and she leans more heavily against Todd; to his surprise, he accepts it. Returns the pressure of bare shoulder against bare shoulder. “Yeah. I am.”

-

“What’s happening here?” Dirk demands. His hands are on his hips. Todd’s hands, in contrast, are on Farah’s hips. Her hips that happen to be resting in his lap, straddling it.

His brain is working hard to catch up, to realize that this is the definition of a compromising position, but Farah beats him to answering the question. “I’m not about to sit around and wait patiently,” she tells Dirk, “For you to get the memo. Either get in,” she groans, “Or wait outside.”

“What do you mean?” Dirk asks, sounding scandalized. “I had dibs!”

“Did not,” Todd tells him, but when Dirk’s face falls he adds “Maybe you did, alright? But there’s - there’s _variables_.”

“I’m a variable, now?” Farah asks, but she’s breathless. Breathless because Todd’s hand has absently drifted higher up her thigh, beneath the hem of her shorts. “I can live with that.”

“Listen,” Todd says, his voice high and a little agitated. Both he and Farah have turned their heads to look at Dirk. “You and me, that’s - that’s,” he falters, “ _Good_. So are me and Farah. And,” Todd goes on, daring to smile, “Maybe three isn’t bad, right? Three can be fun.”

Dirk frowns, crossing his arms. He looks like he’s mulling it over, for a moment, then abruptly declares “I _did_ have dibs, but you might be on to something. Farah,” he says, back to smiling like Christmas has come early, “Would you be terribly inconvenienced if I joined the party?”

Her resounding answer of “Oh, thank _Christ,_ you two have been dancing around this for long enough,” and the way she drags Dirk, laughing delightedly, into the van - there’s no misinterpreting that.

-

Three _can_ be fun, but Todd doesn’t want to be that guy - the guy that wants _only_ fun.

He doesn’t want to be the guy that wants _too much_ , either. He keeps all that anxiety to himself, tucked inside his chest, with Dirk’s leg slung across his hips and Farah’s nose pressed to his temple.

-

The dam, as it turns out, is heavily guarded.

“Guys,” Todd says, trying not to sound too faint, “Maybe we should think about this.”

Farah looks at him, confused. With a shotgun resting on her hip, Todd wonders if it’s normal to be more turned on than scared; it’s a pretty even score, right now. He either wants to run far away from her or pin her to the nearest flat surface.

“What’s there to think about?” Farah asks, gesturing around them. A few yards away, Dirk shouts “Where’s the safety on this thing?” as he waves a gun every which way. It might not be dignified, but Todd ducks down and inches towards the relative safety of the van.

Farah puts down the shotgun, and her newly freed hand rests comfortingly on Todd’s shoulder. “The people in there need us,” she reminds him. “Your sister needs us. We’ve gone over this,” Farah insists. “And if everything goes to hell, we’ll handle it. Don’t we always?”

Todd looks at her, then at Dirk: Dirk, who’s sauntering around the clearing firing trial shots into trees and missing by a large margin. He stares at the crowbar in his own hands, and the abnormally heavy weight of the pistol strapped to his thigh. He looks at Farah’s steady hands.

Sighing, Todd mutters “I guess we do,” to Dirk’s resounding cheer. He waltzes up to them, smile replaced by a grim look - it doesn’t last, of course, when he squeezes between the two of them.

“Group hug,” he says, “Might be our last one, who knows!”

Todd resists the temptation to tell him it might be their first _and_ last, but he keeps his mouth shut. Farah’s arm goes around his neck; Dirk’s around his shoulders. In turn, Todd squeezes them both tightly.

“There’s something I’ve been meaning to tell you,” he says, mostly for Dirk’s benefit. Dirk peers intently at him.

“Todd,” he sighs, “I’m a _detective_. I know all of your secrets.”

A heavy silence weighs between them. “For example,” he elaborates, “I know you’re terribly in love with me, and at least somewhat fond of Farah,” and to that, she snorts, “And I know you’ve got a nasty case of pararibulitis, but this could be our last stand, silly. Tell me the rest of your well-guarded secrets when we all get back alive.”

“Alright,” Todd agrees, turning to face the sunset with Farah at his back, Dirk standing to his right. “You have a deal, and that’s a promise.”


End file.
